Civil Rights and Labor History Consortium / University of Washington

Antiwar and Radical History Project – Pacific Northwest
 Home |  Brief History | Oral Histories |  World War I |  Vietnam War | Anti-Nuke | GI Movement | Photos & Documents 
About | Site Map | Civil Rights and Labor History Consortium
WWI | WWII | Cold War & Korean War | Vietnam War | 1970s/80s
Vietnam Home | Student Activism | Draft Resistance | Photos & Documents
GI Home | History | Oral Histories | Underground Newspapers | Timeline | Resources
Gallery Overview | GI Papers | Ludwig Collection | Lonidier Collection | SDS News | UW Students | 1970 Student Strike
Anti-Nuke Home | Oral Histories | Ground Zero History | Bangor Naval History
World War I Home| Reds, Labor, and the Great War |Antiwar radicalism
From the Ground Zero Center for Non-Violence, founded next door to the nuclear submarine base on Hood Canal.. Click to read about Ground Zero. (Courtesy of the Ground Zero Center Records, Special Collections Library, Univ. of Washington)

Oral Histories

Click on the picture above to watch streaming video interviews with activists from the Ground Zero Center.


The anti-Trident protests indicated a larger strain between civilians and the military. Click to read further. Poster drawn for Ground Zero by William Livermore. (Courtesy Ground Zero Center Records, Special Collections Library, Univ. of Washington.)

Anti-Nuclear Activism: special section

Military installations and industries have long been the mainstay of many regional economies in the Pacific Northwest. Yet, as the history of antiwar activism shows, this relationship was often contested and strained, particularly during the anti-nuclear protests of the 1970s and 1980s.

Particularly in the closing years of the Vietnam War, antiwar activists turned their attention to the threat of nuclear weapons in the Northwest. As distinguished from the radical politics of the GI movement or the self-defense tactics of the Black Panther Party, anti-nuclear activists drew on a host of pacifist, non-violent, and civil disobedience tactics. Many had backgrounds in religious social justice work, and pacifism was both a protest tactic and a personal philosophy.

Anti-nuclear activism continued the social activism of the Vietnam War era and also transformed it. Throughout the 1980s, anti-nuclear activism helped to knit together movements against war, militarism, and specific military interventions.

This section features an in-depth series of research reports and oral histories chronicling the protest movement against the Trident nuclear submarines at Bangor Naval Base, on the Kitsap peninsula, in the 1970s and early 1980s.

Tour the Anti-Nuclear Activism Special Section:

 

Jessie Kindig is the coordinator for this special section.